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Chess: Observing the Mating Patterns of King, Queens and Bishops.


A Horse Named Stranger
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Wasnt it an online game?

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2022/sep/19/chess-magnus-carlsen-resigns-from-online-match-hans-niemann

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“Magnus Carlsen just resigned. Got up and left,” said the Chess24 commentator and chess grandmaster Tania Sachdev. “Switched off his camera, and that’s all we know right now. We’re going to try to get an update on this.”

From the screen grab it looks like they are in different locations. Hans's protestations from here on will be known as the Niemann Defense.

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FFS, when did Magnus turn into such a crybaby. He has no evidence whatsoever that Niemann cheated. This is beyond ridiculous now. At this rate he will end up in some shitty golf club in Florida at the end of the year, and claim that he actually won against Niemann.

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I have to say, complaining about cheating or acting divorced from reality is pretty much par for the course amongst world chess champions (or even those in the highest echelon). Lets begin with Fisher and his numerous crazy conspiracy theories (mostly antisemitic), followed by the various accusations of psychological tricks/mind control stuff between Karpov/Korchnoi, Kasparov vs Deep Blue, Topalov accusing Kramnik of getting assistance in the bathroom, culminating in this latest saga involving Carlsen.

I'd say Vishy and Kramnik seem the most even-keeled of all the world champions thus far, and I thought Magnus was pretty grounded too. However, this year has him make some pronouncements that indicates everything is not all right with him.

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Yeah, but Fischer was legitimately crazy. I firmly believe, if he had visited a clinical psychologist, he would've been diagnosed with Paranoid Schizophrenia. So I'd exclude him (and Stenitz) from that list, as they were legit crazy.

Karpov-Korchnoi was to no small part psychological warfare. And unlike Fischer, Korchnoi's paranoia was at least to some degree understandable/justified. The SU held chess in high regard, and the officials didn't really like the defector Korchnoi. And most of the chess players from that generation were not particularly sociable to begin with. The post-soviet generations (starting with those who had their breakthrough during the 1990s) are more sociable. 

Kramnik-Topalov was pretty much the last huge scandal on that level.  Before this equally embarassing Carlsen-Niemann episode, that is. Carlsen and Topalov are different personalities tho. Topalov during his prime was sorta of a loner. Carlsen is by all accounts way more sociable.

So this episode really feels way out of character for him. 

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Generally we don't find out exactely how cheating occured - hiding it isn't too hard, as I understand.

Others may be more knowledgeable than me about it, and can explain better, but there was a ChessBase-based analysis (from a french player) the other day showing that Niemann had a rather large number of games which correlated perfectly to the machine moves (something that doesn't really happen that often), and that in one of them in particular, the moves he made were out of this world. 

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Well, keep in mind that chess.com has what it has called a "DNA crime scene analysis" for every chess player in the world. My guess is Carlsen is probably basing his accusations on some version of this analysis that they may have shared with him (I think chess.com and him are pretty close collaborators, but not sure). Anyway, here is an article: https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2022/sep/23/the-people-who-police-chess-cheats-we-built-a-scene-analysis-for-every-player-in-the-world

Quote

Rensch said his platform had developed an industry-leading anti-cheating model trained on a staggering trove of real-world game data from games played on its platform. “What we did that really is different than any others do – and it’s because we were a private company that was making money and were able to invest – is we went out and built what I would call DNA crime scene analysis for every chess player in the world,” Rensch said. That means Chess.com has a highly detailed model of what legitimate behavior looks like for millions of users over hundreds of millions of games, which it can use to detect discrepancies.

There are other models described in the article too, that diverge from what chess.com says (including the one FIDE uses). Chess.com may have to divulge more of their analysis to clear up some of the smoke.

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While keeping an open mind to all plausible explanations, there is a not-insignificant amount of unusual circumstances at play here. The thing is, each one of them is not definitive, and could be interpreted either way depending of what you're already inclined to believe.

Yes, Niemann played way above his usual level, finding brilliant and non-obvious moves and casually outplaying world champion. But again - maybe he was "just" inspired and motivated

Yes, Niemann's tournament performance dropped significantly after FIDE introduced stricter anti-cheating measures. But again - his drop could easily be explained by all the stress due to being falsely accessed. 

Yes, Niemann has admitted to cheating before. But again - it doesn't mean that he cheated this time as well.

Yes, Carlsen has shown exemplary record of sportsmanship so far, losing many games in his professional career and not making a scene. Already taking so many losses in stride, presumably he'd not accuse anyone of cheating without some significant evidence, or at least strong suspicion. But again - maybe fame got to him and he made phony accusation for the first time

Yes, no evidence of Niemann cheating was found. but again - maybe he used some hereto new and undetectable method. With ever-advancing technology, it's not that big of a leap.

All in all, however this plays out - chess will be at a loss. Either there is some new undetectable way of cheating which possibly other cheaters will start to use; or a single player was unfairly accused and ganged up by most of online chess community. Either way - it's bad.

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On 9/29/2022 at 7:09 AM, Knight Of Winter said:

Yes, Niemann has admitted to cheating before. But again - it doesn't mean that he cheated this time as well.

Knight of Winter -- I doubt that, but who's gonna do an anal probe to confirm? Not me! The man cheated more than just twice (once is enough to ruin a reputation). Giving the benefit of the doubt is usually good policy, but not when money is at stake and it's done (and willingly admitted) multiple times. To believe otherwise is naïve. Chess.com recently investigated in-house (and documented it with 72-page report! hahaha) and concluded Hans cheated over 100 times during online gaming.

"...Now, however, an investigation into Niemann’s play—conducted by Chess.com, an online platform where many top players compete—has found the scope of his cheating to be far wider and longer-lasting than he publicly admitted.

"The report, reviewed by The Wall Street Journal, alleges that Niemann likely received illegal assistance in more than 100 online games, as recently as 2020. Those matches included contests in which prize money was on the line. The site uses a variety of cheating-detection tools, including analytics that compare moves to those recommended by chess engines, which are capable of beating even the greatest human players every time.

"Rensch wrote a letter to Niemann explaining that “there always remained serious concerns about how rampant your cheating was in prize events” and that there was too much at stake. The letter added that Niemann’s suspicious moves coincided with moments when he had opened up a different screen on his computer—implying that he was consulting a chess engine for the best move..."

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Yeah but that still doesn’t change the timeline or go against what Hans said previously which was he hadn’t cheated since online a couple years ago. Now sure he cheated more times back then when he was 16 but no one has shown yet that he’s cheated over the board since. And like the article said back then when chess.com caught him he admitted it.

Edit: just watched a Gotham video on it where he went over the report. Basically no indication statistically on any OTB cheating. They analyzed his games and compared to his peers he graded middle in things. They also shot down any of these online videos that claim Hans had more 100% otb games than others. So yeah this despite showing he cheated a lot online doesn’t contradict anything he’s said which that he got caught cheating online twice when 12 and 16. That is still true and there is no evidence hes cheated anywhere since mid 2020. 
 

I kind of go with Ben Finegold on this. He’s cheated in the pass yes but no sign he’s cheated over the board. Also it would be really weird for Magnus to act so weirdly after losing to him in the cup in St Louis considering he beat him otb like a week or so earlier in Miami otb. Why did he not do anything then? Likely because he won that match.

Edited by Arakasi
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On 9/20/2022 at 1:29 PM, A Horse Named Stranger said:

FFS, when did Magnus turn into such a crybaby. He has no evidence whatsoever that Niemann cheated. This is beyond ridiculous now. At this rate he will end up in some shitty golf club in Florida at the end of the year, and claim that he actually won against Niemann.

This post hasnt aged well based on today's news

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To be fair, there's no evidence yet for OTB cheating (though there are a few videos showing Niemann to having made rather inhuman moves before - Caruana, Nakamura among others pointing to moves they can't understand). But Niemann's statement that he cheated a couple of times and not at moneyed events are now dubious.

If I've understood things correctly, he's also had a very unusual development trajectory, growing fast at what is much later than other GMs playing at the level he's now rated at. That isn't evidence at all, either, btw.

 

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1 hour ago, Relic said:

This post hasnt aged well based on today's news

The fundamentals haven't really changed with regards to the game in question at the Sinquefield Cup. There's still no evidence, that Niemann cheated against Magnus in that game. 

The news are damaging for Niemann's overall credibility, and he will certainly be observed more closely, but still no real evidence to back up Carlsen's claim. 

58 minutes ago, Arakasi said:

Yeah that was the only thing they found odd from OTB analysis. That instead of rising and plateauing between 8-15 he did it a bit later which is unusual. I guess most top chess players now are 2700 by 12-14 not 18-19z

What?! Like What?! Please tell me which player in the age group of 12-14 is 2.700 rated?  There are none. Anyway, his late blooming could also be attributed to corona. With not much to do or to go, he might have just invested that extra time working on his chess. Not saying, that's what he did, and how he improved in recent years, but it's a possibility.

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Yeah sorry typo there he hit that at 16-17. It’s weird they think so much of difference at that age versus Hans at 19. I meant to say like 2500 there and it seems most players hit that IM/GM level in that age range while he hit it a few years later. (With similar age range between that and 2700)

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Point - if there is one, I can't say - is that in that 2700 group, he's the latest bloomer of them all. Nobody has done that climb at a later age, and even given Covid, it would be expected that he'd have reached GM by 14-15. Which was pre-Covid for Niemann.

Now, as I've said, no OTB has been shown to be true, but Niemann will struggle given that he's an admitted cheat, and that his cheating online has been quite a bit more extensive than what he's admitted to. IIRC that guy FIDE uses for checking cheating agreed with the chess.com analysis in their report.

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